“Only I did think it would interest you—that you'd like to know as soon as possible.”
Impatiently, “Yes. Well?”
“Well—a friend of yours is coming to see you on the three o'clock. A rather good friend. We thought you'd be back by then, you see, and so—”
Oliver's heart jumps queerly for an instant.
“Who?”
But the imp of the perverse has taken complete charge of Mrs. Crowe.
“Oh—a friend. Not a childhood one—oh, no—but a—good—one, though you haven't seen each other for—more than three weeks now, isn't it? You should just be able to make it, I should think, if somebody brought you over in a car, but of course, if you're so busy—” “Mother!”
Then Oliver jangles the little hook of the telephone frantically up and down.
“Mother! Listen! Listen! Who is it? Is it—honestly?”
But Mrs. Crowe has hung up. Shall he get the connection again? But that means waiting—and Mother said he would just be able to make it—and Mother isn't at all the kind that would fool him over a thing like this no matter how much she wanted to tease. Oliver bounds back toward the dining-room and nearly runs into Elinor Piper. He grabs her by the shoulders.